POINT: THE OLYMPICS ARE SWELL
by Michael Dell

How could anyone not be excited about the Olympics? Curling, the Biathlon, the Luge... it's all good. And if that weren't enough, there's also hockey. And this isn't just average run-of-the-mill NHL fare, we're talkin' top-shelf stuff here. All the best players in the world skating on larger rinks without the shackles of the usual clutching and grabbing holding them back. Lindros, LeClair, Sakic, Forsberg, Roy, Selanne, Jagr, Hasek... they'll all be there puttin' on a show. And we, the lucky fans, get to drink it all in as if it were a bottle of Night Train on a lonely, lonely night. It just doesn't get any better than that.

Unlike when NBA stars competed in the Summer Games, this Olympics won't see just a Dream Team, but a Dream Tournament. Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Russia, Sweden, and the United States will all be stacked. While much of the attention is being placed on the Americans and Canadians because of their World Cup rivalry, any of the big six teams could snag gold. This could very well be the greatest hockey tournament ever witnessed by man or chimp.

The various team rosters also provides the opportunity to see some pretty interesting situations. Take Team Canada for example. Colorado's Joe Sakic, Patrick Roy, and Adam Foote are now teammates with Detroit's Steve Yzerman and Brendan Shanahan. That's like putting the Crypts and Bloods together in the same cellblock. Foote and Shanahan have perhaps the best individual rivalry in the league, yet now they're supposed to be best buddies. All the same, it might be a good idea to keep these two away from each other at practice. The games will also feature a Civil War theme, as it turns brother against brother. What's it going to be like to see Sakic line up opposite Peter Forsberg? Imagine Eric Lindros going into a corner with John LeClair, or Paul Kariya and Teemu Selanne racing for a loose puck. This could definitely be some quality entertainment.

Another cool aspect of the NHL being involved is that all the big time superstars going to Nagano will be staying in the Olympic village. There's no pampering the rich. That's right, Gretzky and the boys will be stacked four and five a room just like everybody else. That'll learn 'em. How funny would it be to see Lindros rooming with some figure skater? Hey, that's a hell of a sitcom idea right there. That's what that is.

Of course, you gotta break some eggs to make an omelette. The NHL is shutting down for 17 days in order to allow its stars to compete in Nagano. Some people are up in arms over the fact the league is closing up shop. They say it further cheapens the regular season. Who cares? Hell, I say they should shut down every February. It'll give the guys a chance to mend and get healthy for the final playoff push in March. Let's face it, February always sees the worst hockey of the season. The term "dog days" was invented to describe February hockey in the NHL. Like, maybe next year they could have some international tournament for the average players. All the superstars will stay home and rest, while all the marginal guys descend on Switzerland and have at it. Could be big.

The Olympics will also give the NHL a huge shot of hype. Hockey will be on the front page of every sports section in the United States. And with the league looking to add four new American teams in the next few seasons, a boost of some national pride should go a long way to selling the sport in the new markets. It's all about exposure.

And so what if the games are being played in the middle of the night in the Eastern Time Zone? All the truly cool people are up all night anyway. Now jobless slackers, night watchmen, and prostitutes will finally get a chance to enjoy Olympic hockey. It's only fair.

And let's not overlook Olympic fashion. The new USA jerseys are real wizard. And any occasion to bust out the yellow Swedish sweaters should always be applauded.

So as you can see, Olympic hockey is a good thing. Anyone who says otherwise is a big crank. Jim?

COUNTERPOINT: THE OLYMPICS ARE GAY
by Jim Iovino

Delly, you ignorant slut. Say what you want about the goodness of the Winter Break. Say that it is a great promotional tool for the league to expose itself to new audiences. Tell me again how it will allow the NHL's best and brightest stars to shine on an international level.

You can tell me anything you want about how great the Olympics will be for hockey. But what you're saying isn't the truth.

Do you want truth? I don't think you can handle the truth about the NHL and the Olympics, but I'll tell you anyway. If I didn't, this wouldn't be much of a point/counterpoint...

The truth is that the Olympics are a waste of the NHL's time. The games are an unnecessary extra that puts nothing but an added burden on the NHL's best talent and slows down an already long NHL schedule.

Hockey doesn't need a place to showcase its best talent -- it already has one. Its name is the National Hockey League. On any given night, fans are able to see the world's best hockey players in a highly competitive atmosphere. These aren't players just from the United States or Canada. NHL players come from all over the world. Everyone knows that to be considered one of the world's best, they have to make it in the NHL.

By stopping for the Winter Olympics, the NHL's schedule went into complete disarray. Teams had to play terrible schedules in the first half of the season just to get all the games in on time so the league schedule wouldn't end up being played until August.

The extra number of games tired out most of the league, so much so that by the time Winter Break arrived, most players were ready to collapse from exhaustion and an extended travel schedule. Is that the way a league should be run? Not if the players had their way. A lot of players complained about this year's schedule. It caused fatigue and also made players more prone to injury. That's not the right way to run a league.

But the players get a much-needed rest during Winter Break, right? Wrong. The league's marginal players get a break while the stars continue to get worn down. That means when the schedule starts back up, the muckers and grinders will be fresh and ready to go back to their boring style of hooking and holding. Meanwhile, the league's best will be so tired that they won't be able to put up a fight against the constant interference in the NHL. How about a second-half slogan: "Come see the NHL's finest collapse from exhaustion while the scrubs attempt crossovers."

But let's put that issue aside for a moment. What is the real purpose of placing stars in the Olympics? To bring all of the stars together in one giant tournament, I guess. But if the NHL stopped expansion, the world's best would have more opportunities to play against each other instead of being hounded by lesser talents that should be playing in the IHL.

If the NHL really wanted to showcase the world's best, why only do it for two weeks at the Olympics? The league should do it the entire year by splitting up the NHL into two divisions based on skill. That way the world's best players would face off against each other every night, and the league's lesser talent could beat the crap out of one another in their own league.

Sound crazy? The NHL probably already considered it but said it would be bad for TV ratings or something. And speaking of TV ratings, the ratings for the hockey games in this year's Olympics should be going through the roof. All those stars, all that talent...all of it playing at 5 o'clock in the morning! The NHL must be hoping to cash in on all those millions of people during the "must see TV" 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. time slot.

Besides the diehard hockey fans who will either drink enough Tim Hortons coffee to stay up until those ungodly hours to watch games live or tape the games and watch them the next day (already knowing which team won), not many other people are going to care that much to make the effort to watch. And how many people in North America are going to get excited over a game involving Finland and Sweden? If they don't know about Mats Sundin or Teemu Selanne already, there's not much hope that they'll figure out who they are during the brief amount of time they'll be on the ice during the Olympic games.

That leads to the next point. Ice hockey in the Olympics is going to have to share time with the tons of other sports in the Games. Hockey players aren't going to just be fighting against each other in Nagano. They'll be fighting figure skaters and skiers and curlers for airtime, as well. Ice hockey is going to have to compete against these other sports for airtime during the official broadcasts and during recaps on ESPN and CBC. All eyes won't be on ice hockey. They'll be focused on the Olympics as a whole.

When the NBA sent its "Dream Team" to Barcelona in 1992, the players received the biggest amount of attention any athletes ever had during an Olympic event. That was for two reasons: 1.) Athletes like Michael Jordan were already heroes world wide and could be recognized by just about everyone, and 2.) The Dream Team absolutely demolished every team it faced en route to a gold medal. The Dream Team was something the Olympics had never seen before - for the lack of a better term, it was a freak show on hardwood.

The NHL is putting its stars in the Olympics, but they're not all on one team and there will be no blowouts because of it. Most of the NHL stars aren't exactly household names, anyway. Sure, there's Wayne Gretzky, but the rest of the Olympians would need to wear jerseys and nametags to be recognized by the average man or woman on the streets.

In order to get that recognition the league so desperately wants, it has forced its way into the Olympic games. This "me-to" attitude got the league exposure, but it's coming at a great cost to the league itself. The players are tired. The Olympic hockey games won't be watched by a tremendous amount of people. The NHL is taking a back seat to other sporting events across the country while the Olympics are going on.

As far as I'm concerned, the media hype that is surrounding the NHL players in the Olympics isn't worth its weight in gold (no pun intended) considering all of the factors above.

The NHL is in trouble itself due to a lack of scoring and the constant mugging of the game's top stars. The wide-open play of the Olympics will be a breath of fresh air, but it won't undo the wrongs currently going on in the NHL. The league can try to cover it up, or overlook it, by encouraging gimmicks like Winter Break, but eventually they're going to have to take a good, hard look at their product and admit that there is a lot wrong with it.

Until the league does this and makes the NHL appeal to more fans, staged events like the Olympics won't have an impact on the image of the league.

Those are my views. Thank you. Goodnight. And God bless the Swedes.

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